Poker with a Twist

Honest John Baudine & His Poker-Smart Dog, Clancy
By Big Jim Williams

Readers may recall, “Honest John Bou­dine’s Glass Eye,” a recent story in The Card­room, Northern California’s Poker News. Long before HJ lost his eye, he traveled with Clancy, a big “yeller” dog.

Honest John trotted the Old West by first class mule, his long legs dangled and swayed beneath his four-legged transportation like broken pendulums in a grandfather clock. He rode rim-rod straight on that white critter with the dignity of a prince heading for his coronation, or a dethroned king heading for execution. He stared straight ahead looking for the next saloon offering 5-cent beer, free eats and poker players. HJ was a professional gambler.

He traveled alone, except for Clancy, a big dog that ran at his side. Clancy’s hairy skin sagged like wet bed clothes. Honest John said he was a cross between an “I don’t know,” and a “whatever.” The dog’s big brown eyes maintained a constant vigilance for rabbits or other forms of lunch. He also kept an eye open for marauders, and the needs of his mule-mounted master.

Man and dog were as inseparable as corned beef and cabbage, or drunks trying to sing.

John carefully picked his towns and clients.

After stopping and buying a two-pound raw steak and big chew bone for Clancy in a road-apple, dustbowl cattle-town called Manzanita, Honest John treated himself to a 50-cent bath, a two-bit haircut, and a 10-cent shave, including French toilet water. He shined his boots, dusted his clothes and top hat, and enjoyed a hotel’s breakfast of eggs, fried steak, hot biscuits, and Arbuckle’s finest coffee. He then washed his hands, and rubbed his long fingers with a single drop of virgin olive oil.

He was ready.

A derringer rested inside his coat pocket—-if needed.

His next needs were a saloon, a poker table, and pigeons. He found all three in the Buckeye Belle Saloon.

He settled with his back to the wall at a table that looked like it had been chewed by angry beavers. He opened a new deck of cards, cracked his knuckles, adjusted sleeve garters and stovepipe hat, and cleared his throat.

Clancy curled up on the floor by HJ’s chair.

Then Honest John said:

“All right gentlemen, put your cash money, gold, deeds, chips, reputations, or other valuables on the table, ‘cuz this poker game is about to begin.” He shuffled the pasteboards with an easy flick of his spidery digits, fanned them on the gritty table, and then danced all 52 cards along his right arm like tumbling acrobats.

The wide-eyed gent on his right cut the cards.

“‘Horseshoe’ Higgins the name, sales the game!” said the fat-cheeked man. His jowls drooped like an aging bloodhound’s. Beefy arms, a big smile, and a bad suit completed his image.

“I’m a traveling drummer of women’s ribbon-laced undergarments,” he said. “Bonnets, colorful parasols, fancy toilet waters, notions, nostrums, and Dr. Fenian Fester‘s dollar-a-bottle cure for the vapors.” Then with a wink and whisper: “French postcards, too.”

HJ hoped there was a fat purse in the folds of the man’s Buddha-belly.

A second man came with thick glasses on a potato nose. A smoldering stogie added more color to his yellow-stained walrus mustache. He wore a three-piece suit, belly watch-fob, sparkling diamond stickpin, and a look of confidence.

He placed a fat roll of greenbacks, and a large stack of gold coins on the table, chuckled, and said: “Hyram Postle­thwaite’s the name, banking’s my game.”

The last player resembled an unhappy undertaker—and was. He was tall and skinny, with deep-socket eyes in a long cadaverous head, a pointed black beard, and pasty skin. With a cold handshake, he said:

“Name’s Uriah Skinner, undertaker. My above ground friends call me ‘Digger.’ My dead friends don’t call at all!”

He didn’t laugh.

A flickering oil lamp dangled over the table.

A bottle of the saloon’s finest un-labeled whiskey, and four glasses were produced.

“Only three glasses are needed, barkeep,” said Honest Jones. “I do not drink, or seek nicotine during God’s game of poker. My eyes, ears, and all my concentration, focus, bluff, skill, and deception are on my opponents, and the pack of 52.

“Barkeep,” he gestured, “a cold bottle of sarsaparilla, if you please.”

HJ sipped his drink. The others filled their glasses, anted $10 gold pieces, and settled in their chairs.

Clancy woke, and stretched.

Honest John retained his blank expression, dealt, and opened with two $20 gold coins.

The dog glanced at HJ’s cards, and began scouting the combatants.

Postlethwaite, the yellow-mustached man smiled, took two cards, and raised $50.

Horseshoe and Uriah took three each, and then folded.

Behind Postlethwaite’s chair, Clancy peeked at the banker’s chest-tight cards, and nodded toward his master.

HJ added $100 to the pot.

The mustache man matched, and called.

HJ placed his cards on the knobby ­table: a full house—three kings, and a pair of threes.

Mustache held two queens, two jacks, and a three of clubs. Disgusted, he downed double shots of whiskey, and lighted a fresh cigar.

Honest John scooped up the winnings.

Clancy smiled.

Yellow-mustache did a double take: “I just saw that dog smile?”

“Impossible,” laughed the players. “Dogs can’t smile.”

The frowning banker shooed Clancy away.

Hand after hand, Clancy crawled under and around the table, and squinted at the various hands. He then nodded toward HJ, or shook his head, scratched behind his ears, or wagged his tail left, right, clockwise, or counter-clockwise. Other times he telegraphed results via smiles, yawns, frowns, silently baring his long teeth, or panting fast or slow.

Occasionally, he tilted his hairy head toward a victim, and, like a Naval signalman, sent findings by blinking.

John’s winnings grew like an Egyptian pyramid. He celebrated with a second sarsaparilla.

A small crowd gathered to watch.

Ten hands later, Clancy checked Horseshoe Higgins and Uriah Skinner, before he squatted behind Postlethwaite’s elbow. The dog eyed the man’s cards, and was scratching his right ear, when ...

The banker slammed his cards on the table, and yelled: “Get away!”

Man’s best friend fled to his master.

“Is that your mongrel?” asked the banker.

“What?” Honest John’s stoic expression remained stoic. He rubbed Clancy’s head. “Been following me since Abilene. Can’t get rid of him.”

“He sneaks behind me and reads my cards—”

“Nonsense! He likes you.” HJ sounded more sincere than a conman selling a blind horse to a greenhorn.

“... and signals you.”

A shaking Clancy clung to his master’s leg.

The accuser pointed. “That dog’s sending you messages with his scratching, yawning, tail wagging, and head shaking.”

Honest John sipped his sarsaparilla, and quietly said: “Sir, I’ve never met a hound that could tell a joker from a king of hearts, much less signal someone. Have you boys?”

The two other players chuckled. “Nope, never have,” they said.

Postlethwaite called for a fresh deck.

At eight o’clock they sent out for food, and cigars.

Clancy got their scraps, then slinked behind Postlethwaite: four aces and a deuce.

He eyeballed HJ, and shook his head.

“I fold,” said the mutt’s master.

“Ah-ha! I saw that!” Postlethwaite angrily kicked back his chair, and stood. He pointed at Clancy: “That dog shook his head.”

“It’s what dogs do,” confirmed HJ.

“It was a signal.”

“A signal?”

“About my cards.”

“More likely a signal Clancy has fleas,” chuckled HJ.

“Sit down, Postlethwaite!” growled Horseshoe Higgins. “Dogs don’t know an ace of spades from a dirt plow.”

“Either that dog goes, or I do!”

“Oh, sit down!” repeated Horseshoe. “Forget the mutt.”

Postlethwaite hesitated, then huffed, and fell back into his chair.

Clancy decided it was time to be somewhere else for a while. He slipped outside, shared slurps with a gray mare at a horse-watering trough, soft-padded back into the dimly-lit saloon, and melted into shadows under a nearby table. He resumed signaling, depending on what he could see.

HJ either folded early, or racked up win after win.

Horseshoe Higgins, and Uriah Skinner finished their drinks, and, with empty pockets, departed at midnight.

“Got a morning funeral,” yawned Skinner.

“Got a new line of corsets to sell,” added Horseshoe.

Honest John flipped each a $20 Double Eagles gold coin. “Gentlemen,” he said, “it’s been a pleasure.” He then ordered a third sarsaparilla.

Postlethwaite stood, stretched, and plopped back into his chair. He started to lift his shot glass of whiskey when he saw Clancy peering from under the adjacent table.

“Get out of there!” he yelled, throwing his cigar.

The tail-wagger ducked and skedaddled up the saloon’s stairs. Then, like a phantom, slithered down the dark stairs, and flattened himself on a high step, within eyesight of Honest John, and the banker’s cards.

As each hand was dealt, the canine quietly blinked, twitched his nose, or gestured with a paw.

Honest John’s winnings climbed, Postlethwaite’s didn’t. The last thing the banker lost was his diamond stickpin; his pockets now as empty as those on a Uriah Skinner shroud.

That’s when the game ended with the folding of the cards, and the bartender’s eyelids.

HJ handed Postlethwaite a $20 gold coin, and flipped a $5 one to the barkeep.

“Thank you gentlemen,” he said. He finished his sarsaparilla, and tipped his hat.

As HJ rode west on his white mule under a full moon, he dropped an ace of spades on the trail—-an Honest John trademark of the Old West.

Clancy, who trotted alongside, dropped a half-eaten bone, his trademark.

HJ downed brandy from a pocket flask, puffed on a foot-long, fifty-cent cigar, and fondled his newly acquired diamond stickpin on his lapel.

“Clancy,” he said, “we made more money tonight than in our last two towns combined.”

Clancy stopped to scratch real fleas, then asked: “How much money did we make, boss?”

“$800!”

Clancy released a victory howl that bounced across the plains.

“Shhhh, not so loud,” said Honest Johm. “Wouldn’t want anyone to know you can also talk.”

“Sorry, boss.”

“We’ll be staying in the best hotels,” grinned the gambler, “and eating high on the hog.”

“I’d prefer beef,” laughed Clancy, proving dogs can laugh.

“We’ll rest up,” continued Honest John, “then do the old ‘talking dog’ scam. Drop into a saloon, have a couple of beers, then you start talking. Everybody in the place will wanna buy you. After hemming and hawing I’ll give in, and sell you to the highest bidder. As soon as I leave—-“

“I’ll look my new owner in the eye,” said Clancy, “and say: ‘Just because my old master sold me, I ain’t never gonna say another word!’”

“And you don’t,” chuckled HJ.

“Then I’ll skedaddle, and we’ll meet out of town, and split the take.”

HJ’s laughter grew and carried halfway back to Manzanita.

“Shhhh!” cautioned Clancy.

In Honest John’s autobiography he revealed Clancy not only wigwagged information and talked, but also played poker.

“He wasn’t very good,” said HJ. “Only won every fourth hand.”

Because of Clancy’s talents, maybe that’s why signs are now posted in poker palaces, casinos, gambling halls, and saloons throughout the Old West, stating:

NO DOGS ALLOWED

(Editor’s Note: Honest John claims this story is true. Others say it isn’t. What say we cut the cards to find out? High card wins.)

THE END

(Big Jim Williams is author of the audio books, The Old West, and Tall Tales of the Old West. He’s written for Western Horseman, Shoot!, Livestock (Texas) Weekly, American West, Orchard Press Mysteries, Radio World, Writers’ Journal, The Cardroom Poker News, Sniplets, and other magazines, and the anthology, At Home and Abroad: Prize-Winning Stories. A California broadcaster, a retired publicist, he welcomes emails at: bigjim williams2@cox.net)